From the time the Pilgrims arrived on American soil, faith in God played an important part in shaping our nation. Images of Moses adorn the Supreme Court in recognition of the Judeo-Christian origin of our laws. But it was Taxes, loss of Liberty and oppression from a mad king that led our Founding Fathers to write The Declaration of Independence and start The American Revolution. Today, those who stand for these ideals no longer call themselves The Silent Majority because we are silent no more.

Friday, December 25, 2009

Much has been made about how Democrats are committing political suicide with the healthcare bill and all the other onerous legislation they have proposed and/or passed this year. There is no mistaking that these actions are extremely unpopular. The widespread uncertainty they have fostered in the business community by coupling job-killing legislation and talk of big tax increases with unprecedented, reckless deficit spending has kept our economy at a virtual standstill. And their insulting, arrogant, dishonest and blatantly corrupt behavior has brought citizen concern and anger to a fever pitch, while Democrat poll numbers plummet.

But those who believe in this "Democrat suicide" model implicitly assume next November's elections will be free and fair. Given ACORN’s antics, Democrat Secretaries of State literally stealing elections, shocking abuses of power by Democrats in Congress and the administration, the blatant thuggery of SEIU and other union activists, while the media covers for them, such an assumption is fairy tale fantasy. It would be funny to think some people actually have that much faith in Democrats, if the implications weren't so disastrous. As it is, one can only cry.

Some of us believe this "Democrat suicide" to be a reason for greater concern rather than less. Since FDR, Democrat politicians have demonstrated themselves to be selfish in the extreme, throwing friends under the bus, lying in public, buying voters with vast spending programs that commit government to ever growing expenditures, while the programs themselves prove unfettered disasters; whatever is necessary to accomplish their goals. It is difficult to square this observed behavior with the notion that they would suddenly be running off the cliff like a bunch of lemmings just to pass healthcare in time for Christmas.

It is therefore much more likely that their corruption, their despicable, insulting tactics and breathtaking dishonesty comes of an ominous foreknowledge. We know, for example, that much of the "Stimulus" money is only stimulating Democrats. Despite the supposed focus on “shovel-ready” projects, only 7 percent of the $787 billion in the first Stimulus bill actually was slated for such projects. But when fellow Democrat Peter DeFazio pointed this out, Obama’s answer was, “Don’t think we’re not keeping score, brother.” One can assume a similar attitude drives the auto and banking industry "bailouts," and just about every other piece of legislation. Post bailout, for example, UAW workers pay nothing for a Cadillac healthcare plan now that GM is underwritten by We the People.

We have never before witnessed such brazen corruption. Consider the award of almost $6 million in “Stimulus” monies to companies run by former Hillary Clinton pollster Mark Penn, supposedly to save three jobs. According to The Hill, Clinton still owes Penn $1 million for her 2008 campaign. Looks like we taxpayers are covering that now.

The Obamacare health travesty bill voted on in the wee hours Monday night contains a laundry list of Senate buyoffs, of which Senator Ben Nelson’s (D-NB) $100 million Medicare exclusion for the state of Nebraska is only one. Chris Dodd, facing a daunting re-election battle in Connecticut, got a similar amount for his state, presumably to improve his chances. There are many others. Lindsay Graham, the usually collegial Senator from South Carolina calls the bill “…one of the biggest Ponzi schemes in the history of Washington.” And as if the Democrats couldn’t do more, we now learn this version of the bill allows for covering illegals.

The largest three kickbacks in the Senate bill total $1.2 billion. Sounds like a lot of money with which to bribe voters. But what will it mean when the trillions of dollars in “Stimulus I” and “Stimulus II” (just passed in the House of Representatives) are applied to election contests? Are Democrats overconfident? One can only hope. But if past is prologue, it is a dim hope, at best.

And it gets even worse. After all the secrecy, after blatantly violating sacrosanct Senate rules, after buying off Senators to get their support, Senator Harry Reid’s bill includes a section that will require a super-majority (i.e. two-thirds) of Senators to change any rules relevant to decisions made by the “Independent Medicare Advisory Boards,” aka “Death Panels.” As Redstate reports, Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC) objected that any language requiring a super-majority vote must be approved by a two-thirds majority. For the second time, the Senate presiding officer brushed aside standing Senate rules and said they didn’t apply. This happened today.

Even a former mobster is comparing Obama and Democrats to the Mafia. A post at Anti-Idiotarian Rotweiller contained the following quote, which seems to sum up the issue quite well:

The Left has no intention of giving up power. But they act consistently and almost unanimously in ways that leaving [sic] me biting my tongue to find ways of describing it in this forum, and actively infuriating huge swathes of the American people. If there are honest elections a whole bunch of them are going to lose power, quite possibly enough to take them out of control of the government.

Politicians in a group when they act consistently and anomalously against what would seem to be their own interests, are usually operating on information not available to anyone else. One also has to add to the mix the question why the Republicans as a party are only offering token opposition to the Democrats, when standing up would rally support to them? What do they know?

When you rule out the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, has to be considered. The only thing that remains, that I can see, is that no matter what they do, they no longer have any fear of facing the voters in an honest election. The specific mechanisms and basis for that confidence have yet to be determined. If anyone has a convincing alternative explanation that fits the data; I would gladly entertain it. I really would like to be able to accept an alternative that bodes better for our country, our Constitution, and the future of my children.

In mind of this, two more pieces of legislation have come to light which promise more devastation to our country, more government control, and even more promising prospects for Democrats to extort votes in 2010.

The first is Barney Frank's financial overhaul bill. Michelle Bachman (R-MN) claims it is even worse than the healthcare bill. Michelle tends to shoot from the hip, and sometimes opens herself to criticism as a result, but her assessment of the Frank bill appears to be on the money.

The second is a new illegal immigrant amnesty bill that will flood voter rolls with tens of millions of new Democrat voters, if passed. Anyone want to bet on their chances of getting it through?

And we still have eleven months to go… This nonstop blizzard of society-wrecking legislation continues to follow the Manufactured Crisis format, for anyone still in the dark about it.

In order to win next November, Republican candidates will have to win with vast majorities just to overcome Democrat vote fraud. For close races it will be scorched earth tactics like they used in Florida’s 2004 presidential race.

But they will have an added advantage because they have also been busy stacking the deck through the so-called "SOS Project." This George Soros-funded initiative strives to elect sympathetic Secretaries of State all over the country as they did in Minnesota.

Finally, Obama has gotten four sympathetic “technical advisors” appointed to the U.S. Election Assistance Commission. One of these, Edwin Smith, VP of Dominion Voting Systems, has been called a “scammer” by the Brad Blog, know for its expertise on e-voting machines. Brad Blog describes Smith thusly: "This isn't just the Fox in the Hen House. This is the Fox who has already devoured every Hen in the House, in the Hen House. With feathers in his mouth and a sub-machine gun in his hands."

Smith is a former VP at Sequoia Voting Systems, a producer of voting machines that failed during New Jersey’s 2008 elections. Sequoia had been owned by Smartmatic, a Venezuela-based company tied to the Chavez government and suspected of rigging the Venezuelan vote for Hugo Chavez. Smartmatic was forced to sell off Sequoia after an investigation by the U.S. Treasury and State Departments in 2006, but Sequoia’s software is still owned by Smartmatic. Smartmatic in turn, got its technology from Dominion, Smiths latest employer.

If all this fails, it is not inconceivable that they would take some more blatant extra-legal step, to shut down, postpone or otherwise nullify election results. If this sounds too extreme, consider: the Democrats are staking their future on a legislative, rhetorical and legal strategy that is alienating the entire country.

Are they really that stupid?

Related video: Why Switzerland is the safest, most free country in the world.

UPDATE: There appears to be a movement already afoot among some states to nullify any healthcare measure that comes out of this Congress. Nullification is an innovative Constitutional strategy states may use to neutralize onerous federal law the state believes to be unconstitutional. This comes out of the nascent 10th Amendment movement within some states to reassert authority that the federal government has been undermining for a long time. It is nice to be able to offer this positive bit of news as Christmas approaches, given Congressional Democrats' apparent determination to play the Grinch and wreak as much havoc as possible in this Christmas season.

America waits with bated breath while Washington struggles to bring the U.S. economy back from the brink of disaster. But many of those same politicians caused the crisis, and if left to their own devices will do so again.

Despite the mass media news blackout, a series of books, talk radio and the blogosphere have managed to expose Barack Obama's connections to his radical mentors -- Weather Underground bombers William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, Communist Party member Frank Marshall Davis and others. David Horowitz and his Discover the Networks.org have also contributed a wealth of information and have noted Obama's radical connections since the beginning.

Yet, no one to my knowledge has yet connected all the dots between Barack Obama and the Radical Left. When seen together, the influences on Obama's life comprise a who's who of the radical leftist movement, and it becomes painfully apparent that not only is Obama a willing participant in that movement, he has spent most of his adult life deeply immersed in it.

But even this doesn't fully describe the extreme nature of this candidate. He can be tied directly to a malevolent overarching strategy that has motivated many, if not all, of the most destructive radical leftist organizations in the United States since the 1960s.

The Cloward-Piven Strategy of Orchestrated Crisis

In an earlier post, I noted the liberal record of unmitigated legislative disasters, the latest of which is now being played out in the financial markets before our eyes. Before the 1994 Republican takeover, Democrats had sixty years of virtually unbroken power in Congress - with substantial majorities most of the time. Can a group of smart people, studying issue after issue for years on end, with virtually unlimited resources at their command, not come up with a single policy that works? Why are they chronically incapable?

Why?

One of two things must be true. Either the Democrats are unfathomable idiots, who ignorantly pursue ever more destructive policies despite decades of contrary evidence, or they understand the consequences of their actions and relentlessly carry on anyway because they somehow benefit.

I submit to you they understand the consequences. For many it is simply a practical matter of eliciting votes from a targeted constituency at taxpayer expense; we lose a little, they gain a lot, and the politician keeps his job. But for others, the goal is more malevolent - the failure is deliberate. Don't laugh. This method not only has its proponents, it has a name: the Cloward-Piven Strategy. It describes their agenda, tactics, and long-term strategy.

The Strategy was first elucidated in the May 2, 1966 issue of The Nation magazine by a pair of radical socialist Columbia University professors, Richard Andrew Cloward and Frances Fox Piven. David Horowitz summarizes it as:

The strategy of forcing political change through orchestrated crisis. The "Cloward-Piven Strategy" seeks to hasten the fall of capitalism by overloading the government bureaucracy with a flood of impossible demands, thus pushing society into crisis and economic collapse.

"Make the enemy live up to their (sic) own book of rules," Alinsky wrote in his 1989 book Rules for Radicals. When pressed to honor every word of every law and statute, every Judeo-Christian moral tenet, and every implicit promise of the liberal social contract, human agencies inevitably fall short. The system's failure to "live up" to its rule book can then be used to discredit it altogether, and to replace the capitalist "rule book" with a socialist one. (Courtesy Discover the Networks.org)

Their strategy to create political, financial, and social chaos that would result in revolution blended Alinsky concepts with their more aggressive efforts at bringing about a change in U.S. government. To achieve their revolutionary change, Cloward and Piven sought to use a cadre of aggressive organizers assisted by friendly news media to force a re-distribution of the nation's wealth.

In their Nation article, Cloward and Piven were specific about the kind of "crisis" they were trying to create:

By crisis, we mean a publicly visible disruption in some institutional sphere. Crisis can occur spontaneously (e.g., riots) or as the intended result of tactics of demonstration and protest which either generate institutional disruption or bring unrecognized disruption to public attention.

No matter where the strategy is implemented, it shares the following features:

The offensive organizes previously unorganized groups eligible for government benefits but not currently receiving all they can.

The offensive seeks to identify new beneficiaries and/or create new benefits.

The overarching aim is always to impose new stresses on target systems, with the ultimate goal of forcing their collapse.

Capitalizing on the racial unrest of the 1960s, Cloward and Piven saw the welfare system as their first target. They enlisted radical black activist George Wiley, who created the National Welfare Reform Organization (NWRO) to implement the strategy. Wiley hired militant foot soldiers to storm welfare offices around the country, violently demanding their "rights." According to a City Journal article by Sol Stern, welfare rolls increased from 4.3 million to 10.8 million by the mid-1970s as a result, and in New York City, where the strategy had been particularly successful, "one person was on the welfare rolls... for every two working in the city's private economy."

The movement's impact on New York City was jolting: welfare caseloads, already climbing 12 percent a year in the early sixties, rose by 50 percent during Lindsay's first two years; spending doubled... The city had 150,000 welfare cases in 1960; a decade later it had 1.5 million.

The vast expansion of welfare in New York City that came of the NWRO's Cloward-Piven tactics sent the city into bankruptcy in 1975. Rudy Giuliani cited Cloward and Piven by name as being responsible for "an effort at economic sabotage." He also credited Cloward-Piven with changing the cultural attitude toward welfare from that of a temporary expedient to a lifetime entitlement, an attitude which in-and-of-itself has caused perhaps the greatest damage of all.

Cloward and Piven looked at this strategy as a gold mine of opportunity. Within the newly organized groups, each offensive would find an ample pool of foot soldier recruits willing to advance its radical agenda at little or no pay, and expand its base of reliable voters, legal or otherwise. The radicals' threatening tactics also would accrue an intimidating reputation, providing a wealth of opportunities for extorting monetary and other concessions from the target organizations. In the meantime, successful offensives would create an ever increasing drag on society. As they gleefully observed:

Moreover, this kind of mass influence is cumulative because benefits are continuous. Once eligibility for basic food and rent grants is established, the drain on local resources persists indefinitely.

The next time you drive through one of the many blighted neighborhoods in our cities, or read of the astronomical crime, drug addiction, and out-of-wedlock birth rates, or consider the failed schools, strapped police and fire resources of every major city, remember Cloward and Piven's thrill that "...the drain on local resources persists indefinitely."

ACORN, the new tip of the Cloward-Piven spear

In 1970, one of George Wiley's protégés, Wade Rathke -- like Bill Ayers, a member of the radical Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) -- was sent to found the Arkansas Community Organizations for Reform Now. While NWRO had made a good start, it alone couldn't accomplish the Cloward-Piven goals. Rathke's group broadened the offensive to include a wide array of low income "rights." Shortly thereafter they changed "Arkansas" to "Association of" and ACORN went nationwide.

Today ACORN is involved in a wide array of activities, including housing, voting rights, illegal immigration and other issues. According to ACORN's website: "ACORN is the nation's largest grassroots community organization of low-and moderate-income people with over 400,000 member families organized into more than 1,200 neighborhood chapters in 110 cities across the country," It is perhaps the largest radical group in the U.S. and has been cited for widespread criminal activity on many fronts.

Voting

On voting rights, ACORN and its voter mobilization subsidiary, Project Vote, have been involved nationwide in efforts to grant felons the vote and lobbied heavily for the Motor Voter Act of 1993, a law allowing people to register at motor vehicle departments, schools, libraries and other public places. That law had been sought by Cloward and Piven since the early1980s and they were present, standing behind President Clinton at the signing ceremony.

ACORN's voter rights tactics follow the Cloward-Piven Strategy:

1. Register as many Democrat voters as possible, legal or otherwise and help them vote, multiple times if possible.

2. Overwhelm the system with fraudulent registrations using multiple entries of the same name, names of deceased, random names from the phone book, even contrived names.

3. Make the system difficult to police by lobbying for minimal identification standards.

ACORN's website brags: "Since 2004, ACORN has helped more than 1.7 million low- and moderate-income and minority citizens apply to register to vote." Project vote boasts 4 million. I wonder how many of them are dead? For the 2008 cycle, ACORN and Project Vote have pulled out all the stops. Given their furious nationwide effort, it is not inconceivable that this presidential race could be decided by fraudulent votes alone.

By advocating massive, no-holds-barred voter registration campaigns, they [Cloward & Piven] sought a Democratic administration in Washington, D.C. that would re-distribute the nation's wealth and lead to a totalitarian socialist state.

The burden of illegal immigration on our already overstressed welfare system has been widely documented. Some towns in California have even been taken over by illegal immigrant drug cartels. The disease, crime and overcrowding brought by illegal immigrants places a heavy burden on every segment of society and every level of government, threatening to split this country apart at the seams. In the meantime, radical leftist efforts to grant illegal immigrants citizenship guarantee a huge pool of new democrat voters. With little border control, terrorists can also filter in.

Obama aided ACORN as their lead attorney in a successful suit he brought against the Illinois state government to implement the Motor Voter law there. The law had been resisted by Republican Governor Jim Edgars, who feared the law was an opening to widespread vote fraud.

His fears were warranted as the Motor Voter law has since been cited as a major opportunity for vote fraud, especially for illegal immigrants, even terrorists. According to the Wall Street Journal: "After 9/11, the Justice Department found that eight of the 19 hijackers were registered to vote..."

ACORN's dual offensives on voting and illegal immigration are handy complements. Both swell the voter rolls with reliable democrats while assaulting the country ACORN seeks to destroy with overwhelming new problems.

Mortgage Crisis

And now we have the mortgage crisis, which has sent a shock wave through Wall Street and panicked world financial markets like no other since the stock market crash of 1929. But this is a problem created in Washington long ago. It originated with the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA), signed into law in 1977 by President Jimmy Carter. The CRA was Carter's answer to a grassroots activist movement started in Chicago, and forced banks to make loans to low income, high risk customers. PhD economist and former Texas Senator Phil Gramm has called it: "a vast extortion scheme against the nation's banks."

In the 1980s, groups such as the activists at ACORN began pushing charges of "redlining"-claims that banks discriminated against minorities in mortgage lending. In 1989, sympathetic members of Congress got the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act amended to force banks to collect racial data on mortgage applicants; this allowed various studies to be ginned up that seemed to validate the original accusation.

In fact, minority mortgage applications were rejected more frequently than other applications-but the overwhelming reason wasn't racial discrimination, but simply that minorities tend to have weaker finances.

ACORN showed its colors again in 1991, by taking over the House Banking Committee room for two days to protest efforts to scale back the CRA. Obama represented ACORN in the Buycks-Roberson v. Citibank Fed. Sav. Bank, 1994 suit against redlining. Most significant of all, ACORN was the driving force behind a 1995 regulatory revision pushed through by the Clinton Administration that greatly expanded the CRA and laid the groundwork for the Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac borne financial crisis we now confront. Barack Obama was the attorney representing ACORN in this effort. With this new authority, ACORN used its subsidiary, ACORN Housing, to promote subprime loans more aggressively.

A 1995 strengthening of the Community Reinvestment Act required banks to find ways to provide mortgages to their poorer communities. It also let community activists intervene at yearly bank reviews, shaking the banks down for large pots of money.

Flexible lending programs expanded even though they had higher default rates than loans with traditional standards. On the Web, you can still find CRA loans available via ACORN with "100 percent financing . . . no credit scores . . . undocumented income . . . even if you don't report it on your tax returns." Credit counseling is required, of course.

Ironically, an enthusiastic Fannie Mae Foundation report singled out one paragon of nondiscriminatory lending, which worked with community activists and followed "the most flexible underwriting criteria permitted." That lender's $1 billion commitment to low-income loans in 1992 had grown to $80 billion by 1999 and $600 billion by early 2003.

The lender they were speaking of was Countrywide, which specialized in subprime lending and had a working relationship with ACORN.

The revisions also allowed for the first time the securitization of CRA-regulated loans containing subprime mortgages. The changes came as radical "housing rights" groups led by ACORN lobbied for such loans. ACORN at the time was represented by a young public-interest lawyer in Chicago by the name of Barack Obama. (Emphasis, mine.)

Since these loans were to be underwritten by the government sponsored Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the implicit government guarantee of those loans absolved lenders, mortgage bundlers and investors of any concern over the obvious risk. As Bloomberg reported: "It is a classic case of socializing the risk while privatizing the profit."

And if you think Washington policy makers cared about ACORN's negative influence, think again. Before this whole mess came down, a Democrat-sponsored bill on the table would have created an "Affordable Housing Trust Fund," granting ACORN access to approximately $500 million in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac revenues with little or no oversight.

This entire fiasco represents perhaps the pinnacle of ACORN's efforts to advance the Cloward-Piven Strategy and is a stark demonstration of the power they wield in Washington.

Enter Barack Obama

In attempting to capture the significance of Barack Obama's Radical Left connections and his relation to the Cloward Piven strategy, I constructed following flow chart. It is by no means complete. There are simply too many radical individuals and organizations to include them all here. But these are perhaps the most significant.

The chart puts Barack Obama at the epicenter of an incestuous stew of American radical leftism. Not only are his connections significant, they practically define who he is. Taken together, they constitute a who's who of the American radical left, and guiding all is the Cloward-Piven strategy.

Conspicuous in their absence are any connections at all with any other group, moderate, or even mildly leftist.They are all radicals, firmly bedded in the anti-American, communist, socialist, radical leftist mesh.

Saul Alinsky

Most people are unaware that Barack Obama received his training in "community organizing" from Saul Alinsky's Industrial Areas Foundation. But he did. In and of itself that marks his heritage and training as that of a radical activist. One really needs go no further. But we have.

Bill Ayers

Obama objects to being associated with SDS bomber Bill Ayers, claiming he is being smeared with "guilt by association." But they worked together at the Woods Fund. The Wall Street Journal added substantially to our knowledge by describing in great detail Obama's work over five years with SDS bomber Bill Ayers on the board of a non-profit, the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, to push a radical agenda on public school children. As Stanley Kurtz states:

"...the issue here isn't guilt by association; it's guilt by participation. As CAC chairman, Mr. Obama was lending moral and financial support to Mr. Ayers and his radical circle. That is a story even if Mr. Ayers had never planted a single bomb 40 years ago."

Also included in the mix is Theresa Heinz Kerry's favorite charity, the Tides Foundation. A partial list of Tides grants tells you all you need to know: ACLU, ACORN, Center for American Progress, Center for Constitutional Rights (a communist front,) CAIR, Earth Justice, Institute for Policy Studies (KGB spy nest), National Lawyers Guild (oldest communist front in U.S.), People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), and practically every other radical group there is. ACORN's Wade Rathke runs a Tides subsidiary, the Tides Center.

Carl Davidson and the New Party

We have heard about Bomber Bill, but we hear little about fellow SDS member Carl Davidson. According to Discover the Networks, Davidson was an early supporter of Barack Obama and a prominent member of Chicago's New Party, a synthesis of CPUSA members, Socialists, ACORN veterans and other radicals. Obama sought and received the New Party's endorsement, and they assisted with his campaign. The New Party also developed a strong relationship with ACORN. As an excellent article on the New Party observes: "Barack Obama knew what he was getting into and remains an ideal New Party candidate."

George Soros

The chart also suggests the reason for George Soros' fervent support of Obama. The President of his Open Society Institute is Aryeh Neier, founder of the radical Students for a Democratic Society (SDS). As mentioned above, three other former SDS members had extensive contact with Obama: Bill Ayers, Carl Davidson and Wade Rathke. Surely Aryeh Neier would have heard from his former colleagues of the promising new politician. More to the point, Neier is firmly committed to supporting the hugely successful radical organization, ACORN, and would be certain back their favored candidate, Barack Obama.

ACORN

Obama has spent a large portion of his professional life working for ACORN or its subsidiaries, representing ACORN as a lawyer on some of its most critical issues, and training ACORN leaders. Stanley Kurtz's excellent National Review article, "Inside Obama's Acorn." also describes Obama's ACORN connection in detail. But I can't improve on Obama's own words:

I've been fighting alongside ACORN on issues you care about my entire career (emphasis added). Even before I was an elected official, when I ran Project Vote voter registration drive in Illinois, ACORN was smack dab in the middle of it, and we appreciate your work. - Barack Obama, Speech to ACORN, November 2007 (Courtesy Newsmax.)

In another excellent article on Obama's ACORN connections, Newsmax asks a nagging question:

It would be telling to know if Obama, during his years at Columbia, had occasion to meet Cloward and study the Cloward-Piven Strategy.

I ask you, is it possible ACORN would train Obama to take leadership positions within ACORN without telling him what he was training for? Is it possible ACORN would put Obama in leadership positions without clueing him into what his purpose was?? Is it possible that this most radical of organizations would put someone in charge of training its trainers, without him knowing what it was he was training them for?

As a community activist for ACORN; as a leadership trainer for ACORN; as a lead organizer for ACORN's Project Vote; as an attorney representing ACORN's successful efforts to impose Motor Voter regulations in Illinois; as ACORN's representative in lobbying for the expansion of high risk housing loans through Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that led to the current crisis; as a recipient of their assistance in his political campaigns -- both with money and campaign workers; it is doubtful that he was unaware of ACORN's true goals. It is doubtful he was unaware of the Cloward-Piven Strategy.

In his few years as a U.S. senator, Obama has received campaign contributions of $126,349, from Fannie and Freddie, second only to the $165,400 received by Senator Chris Dodd, who has been getting donations from them since 1988. What makes Obama so special?

Johnson had to step down as adviser on Obama's V.P. search after this gem came out:

An Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight (OFHEO) report[1] from September 2004 found that, during Johnson's tenure as CEO, Fannie Mae had improperly deferred $200 million in expenses. This enabled top executives, including Johnson and his successor, Franklin Raines, to receive substantial bonuses in 1998.[2] A 2006 OFHEO report[3] found that Fannie Mae had substantially under-reported Johnson's compensation. Originally reported as $6-7 million, Johnson actually received approximately $21 million.

Obama denies ties to Raines but the Washington Post calls him a member of "Obama's political circle." Raines and Johnson were fined $3 million by the Office of Federal Housing Oversight for their manipulation of Fannie books. The fine is small change however, compared to the $50 million Raines was able to obtain in improper bonuses as a result of juggling the books.

Most significantly, Penny Pritzker, the current Finance Chairperson of Obama's presidential campaign helped develop the complicated investment bundling of subprime securities at the heart of the meltdown. She did so in her position as shareholder and board chair of Superior Bank. The Bank failed in 2001, one of the largest in recent history, wiping out $50 million in uninsured life savings of approximately 1,400 customers. She was named in a RICO class action law suit but doesn't seem to have come out of it too badly.

As a young attorney in the 1990s, Barack Obama represented ACORN in Washington in their successful efforts to expand Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) authority. In addition to making it easier for ACORN groups to force banks into making risky loans, this also paved the way for banks like Superior to package mortgages as investments, and for the Government Sponsored Enterprises Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to underwrite them. These changes created the conditions that ultimately lead to the current financial crisis.

Did they not know this would occur? Were these smart people, led by a Harvard graduate, unaware of the Econ 101 concept of moral hazard that would result from the government making implicit guarantees to underwrite private sector financial risk? They should have known that freeing the high-risk mortgage market of risk, calamity was sure to ensue. I think they did.

Barack Obama, the Cloward-Piven candidate, no matter how he describes himself, has been a radical activist for most of his political career. That activism has been in support of organizations and initiatives that at their heart seek to tear the pillars of this nation asunder in order to replace them with their demented socialist vision. Their influence has spread so far and so wide that despite their blatant culpability in the current financial crisis, they are able to manipulate Capital Hill politicians to cut them into $140 billion of the bailout pie!

God grant those few responsible yet remaining in Washington, DC the strength to prevent this massive fraud from occurring. God grant them the courage to stand up in the face of this Marxist tidal wave.

Wednesday, December 23, 2009

On December 16, 2009, Barack Hussein Obama issued Executive Order 13524 (full text below from the Federal Register) that has removed all restrictions previously in force and now gives Interpol complete immunity against U.S. citizens on U.S. soil. What this means is that Interpol now has greater authority over Americans within our own country than our own police agencies. The loss of U.S. Sovereignty means that with the removal of previous restrictions enacted by President Reagan with his Executive Order 12425 issued in 1983, Interpol now has diplomatic immunity and is not restrained by the power of the Bill of Rights or the United States Constitution.

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including section 1 of the International Organizations Immunities Act (22 U.S.C. 288), and in order to extend the appropriate privileges, exemptions, and immunities to the International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL), it is hereby ordered that Executive Order 12425 of June 16, 1983, as amended, is further amended by deleting from the first sentence the words ``except those provided by Section 2(c), Section3, Section 4, Section 5, and Section 6 of that Act''and the semicolon that immediately precedes them.

Last Thursday, December 17, 2009, The White House released an Executive Order "Amending Executive Order 12425." It grants INTERPOL (International Criminal Police Organization) a new level of full diplomatic immunity afforded to foreign embassies and select other "International Organizations" as set forth in the United States International Organizations Immunities Act of 1945.By removing language from President Reagan's 1983 Executive Order 12425, this international law enforcement body now operates - now operates - on American soil beyond the reach of our own top law enforcement arm, the FBI, and is immune from Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA) requests.

After initial review and discussions between the writers of this analysis, the context was spelled out plainly.

And then comes December 17, 2009, and President Obama. The exemptions in EO 12425 were removed.

Section 2c of the United States International Organizations Immunities Act is the crucial piece.

Property and assets of international organizations, wherever located and by whomsoever held, shall be immune from search, unless such immunity be expressly waived, and from confiscation. The archives of international organizations shall be inviolable. (Emphasis added.)

Inviolable archives means INTERPOL records are beyond US citizens' Freedom of Information Act requests and from American legal or investigative discovery ("unless such immunity be expressly waived.")

Property and assets being immune from search and confiscation means precisely that. Wherever they may be in the United States. This could conceivably include human assets - Americans arrested on our soil by INTERPOL officers.

Context: International Criminal Court

The importance of this last crucial point cannot be understated, because this immunity and protection - and elevation above the US Constitution - afforded INTERPOL is likely a precursor to the White House subjecting the United States under the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court (ICC). INTERPOL provides a significant enforcement function for the ICC, just as our FBI provides a significant function for our Department of Justice.

Andy McCarthy wonders the same thing:

Interpol’s property and assets are no longer subject to search and confiscation, and its archives are now considered inviolable. This international police force (whose U.S. headquarters is in the Justice Department in Washington) will be unrestrained by the U.S. Constitution and American law while it operates in the United States and affects both Americans and American interests outside the United States.

Interpol works closely with international tribunals (such as the International Criminal Court — which the United States has refused to join because of its sovereignty surrendering provisions, though top Obama officials want us in it). It also works closely with foreign courts and law-enforcement authorities (such as those in Europe that are investigating former Bush administration officials for purported war crimes — i.e., for actions taken in America’s defense).

Why would we elevate an international police force above American law? Why would we immunize an international police force from the limitations that constrain the FBI and other American law-enforcement agencies? Why is it suddenly necessary to have, within the Justice Department, a repository for stashing government files which, therefore, will be beyond the ability of Congress, American law-enforcement, the media, and the American people to scrutinize?

I seem to recall the Left getting hysterical over the Patriot Act extensions that Obama finally backed. This gives Interpol a much wider operational latitude than anything contemplated in the Patriot Act, and with no accountability at all.

Suddenly, it’s a ghost town. All the Musilm jihadists seem to have disappeared, raising grave concerns among FBI and Homeland Security officials that an onset of jihadist activity here may be imminent.

By Paul Williams

Hundreds of Muslim men are missing from Islamberg and this is not a propitious omen.U.S. investigators are discovering that more and more young Muslims are vanishing from mosques, madrassas, and Islamic centers.

The sentry post is gone and no guards are in sight at the entrance to the 70 acre Islamic settlement located in the dense forest between Deposit and Hancock in upper New York State. Young men in Islamic garb no longer congregate before the makeshift mosque, and no students are in attendance at the one room shack that serves as Sheikh Gilani’s “International Quranic Open University.” Gunfire no longer can be heard from the firing ranges along the eastern parameter of the property – and no grunts come from new recruits at the obstacle course.

What has happened to this once bustling complex of radical Islamists – a place where the cries of muezzins were accompanied by the incessant rat-tat-tat of machine gunfire? Where are the Arab dignitaries that used to visit this remote community in chauffeur-driven limousines? Where are the armed sentries who warded away all intruders?

What has happened to this bustling center of jihadi training? What has happened to this bustling center of jihadi training? Why has Islamberg become a ghost town? The same phenomenon of vanishing Muslim men is taking place at mosques, madrassas, and other Islamic communities throughout the country and at other Jamaat ul-Fuqra paramilitary compounds, including one in Red House, Virginia.

U.S. investigators have now discovered that many of the missing Muslims are showing up in the killing fields of Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Somalia. Five American Muslims recently were arrested in Pakistan following a raid at the home of a member of the Jaish-e-Muhammad, a Pakistani movement designated as a terrorist group by the U.S. Treasury Department in 2001.

David Coleman Headley, another Muslim who disappeared, is a native of Chicago who attended Lashkar-e-Toiba-operated terrorism training camps in Pakistan and helped Lashker-e-Toiba members and others plan and execute the attacks in Denmark against the newspaper which published cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed, which Muslims found offensive, as well as the violent attack in Mumbai, in about 170 people died.

At the same time Headley was taken into custody, U.S. investigators discovered that 20 Somali immigrants, who were reported missing from a mosque in Minnesota, had joined the Islamist insurgent group, al Shabaab, and were engaged in fighting Somalia’s U.S.-backed government.

Where are the Muslim men from Islamberg? The answer comes from a heavy-set woman in a long black burka who stops to check her mail box. “The men – all gone,” she says in halting English. “All – in Pakistan.” Now that the recruits at Islamberg have been trained in the basics of guerilla warfare, they have been deployed to Pakistan for advanced courses in explosives and weapons of mass destruction.

Islamic Terrorist Camps are located in 22 states around America.

The Christian Action Network(CAN) has produced an important new film about the 35 para-military training camps in 22 states in the U.S. and Canada. These camps are sponsored by the terrorist group Jamaat ul-Fuqra (JF) or “community of the impoverished” and its notorious Pakistani founder, Sheik Mubarak Ali Gilani. The film is entitled: “Homegrown Jihad: Terrorist Camps Around the U.S.” This is an important documentary on a subject I’ve written about in theNew English Review,” Jamaat ul-Fuqra: The best positioned group to help al-Qaeda launch an attack in the US.” I noted the following in the NER article on JF:

The group here in the US has committed attacks and robberies, acquired contraband arms, engaging in counterfeiting activities, and proselytized effectively among Afro-American prison inmates. JF members participated in the 1993 terror bombing of the World Trade Center.

JF seeks to “purify Islam” through violence.

What is of great concern is that federal and state law enforcement authorities have investigated and monitored JF and its front group Muslims of the Americas (MoA) and delisted the group as a terrorist organization. Nor has the IRS taken away MoA’s charitable tax exempt status.

Sunday, December 20, 2009

When does the rule of law take precedence over religious custom? For the sake of legal proceedings when identification is an important factor, covering one's face from public view serves no legitimate purpose. When you are called to testify in court or appear in court as a defendant, identification is more important than any ethic custom. When you go into a bank to withdraw money from an account you must provide photo identification to prove who you are. When you go into a polling place to cast a vote you must also prove who you are. The most common form of photo ID is a Driver's License. So how has the state of New Jersey handled this matter? Take a look.

When the argument began years ago over establishing English as the official language in America many people with lots of air between their ears opposed this. Then a new concept of Political Correctness entered our society and we were told we had to accept everyone as they were. On the thought of diversity and Political Correctness, we need only to remember the tragic terrorist attack at Fort Hood, Texas by a radical Muslim Army officer named Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan to see how those who refuse to acknowledge the danger of not confronting ethnic behavior can have such consequences. Maybe it is time to take a step back and look at this once again.

I came across this story about the extent of influence Muslims in Great Britain are having on government affairs and British culture. It has already been pointed out that Muslims are increasing in numbers by an alarming rate, much faster than non-Muslims and already several cities in America have Muslim populations in excess of 25%. Regardless of the numbers, there is no reason why common sense law should be changed to accommodate a special ethnic or cultural group.

As terrorists lay siege to the remnants of Great Britain, the moonbats who have reduced this great country to such a vulnerable state continue to chip away from within, working in more or less open alliance with the West's jihadist enemies. The situation is so bad now that Manchester magistrate Ian Murray faces disciplinary action because he refused to deal with a defendant who would not show her face in court. Zoobia Hussain is of course "shocked and distressed" that anyone would expect her to take off her Muslim veil for the sake of legal proceedings, just so people can see who she is, as if the UK were its own country with its own legal traditions that should take precedence over Islamic ways.

Given a choice between rule of law and pandering obsequiously to Muslims, the authorities choose the latter with ever-increasing regularity. Murray is already groveling and apologizing, so he may be permitted to keep his position, so long as he never again questions the confines of the shameful dhimmitude Britain has voluntarily chosen to adopt in the name of political correctness.

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

This is incredible. Children praying to a religion not their own -- obscene. The laughable quote is that the parents who objected were called "islamophobes" by Shariq Siddiqui of theMuslim Alliance of Indiana. “It’s unfortunate if that was removed from the program just because of Islamophobic feelings.”

If I had been a Christian parent at this school, I would have gone ballistic.

Pamela, I am a CHRISTIAN and I am OUTRAGED.

Advancing colonization.

Second Graders Sing About Allah?A battle over religion is brewing in central Indiana after a public school wanted second graders to sing a song declaring, “Allah is God.” The phrase was removed just before the performance after a national conservative group launched a protest.
The principal of Lantern Road Elementary School in Fishers, IN, said they were trying to teach inclusiveness through their holiday production. It included references to Christmas, Hanukkah, Ramadan, Las Posadas and Kwanzaa. However, no other deity, other than Allah, was referenced in the show.
“It went off…without a hitch,” Danielle Thompson told the Indianapolis Star. “Several families thought it was a nice program.”
But others did not – especially David Hogan. His daughter came home with a copy of the lyrics just days before the production. Hogan, a Christian, told the American Family Association, a conservative advocacy group, that he was deeply concerned to learn that his daughter had been singing, “Allah is God.”

Here’s what the children were assigned to sing:

“Allah is God, we recall at dawn,
Praying ‘til night during Ramadan
At this joyful time we pray happiness for you,
Allah be with you all your life through.”

But when it came time to perform the “Christian” part of Christmas, children were assigned to say:

“I didn’t know there was a little boy at the manger. What child is this?
I’m not sure if there was a little boy or not.
Then why did you paint one on your nativity window?
I just thought if there was a little boy, I’d like to know exactly what he (sic) say.

Micah Clark, executive director of the Indiana AFA, launched an Internet protest once he heard about the allegations. “What surprised me here is that we’ve had a secular scrubbing of Christmas for so long and the school apparently didn’t see the problem with kids singing to Allah,” he told FOX News Radio. “You won’t even mention Jesus and you’re going to force my child to sing about Allah?

In email correspondence the school initially defended the reference as a way to be inclusive of all religions. However, once complaints starting rolling in, school leaders decided to eliminate the Allah reference.

That drew the ire of the Muslim Alliance of Indiana. “It’s unfortunate if that was removed from the program just because of Islamophobic feelings,” Shariq Siddiqui told the Indianapolis Star. “Schools are a place where we should learn more about each other rather than exclude each other based on stereotypes and misconceptions.”

But Clark said having children bow and pray is problematic for non-Muslim families. “(This show) affirmed Islam and negated Christianity. I wouldn’t have had a problem if it had been equal to all faiths.”

At least one Christian family approved of the Allah reference. “I’m a Christian and I was in no way offended by the program at Lantern Road,” said Judy Grasso to The Star.

Imagine that, radical Muslims are calling a video that accurately portrays Muslim jihadist training camps in the U.S. as a video designed to cause hatred for Muslims in America. Hate to tell you this, but the hatred for Muslims already exists, and the video by Christian Action Network just confirms why.

For several years the Christian Action Network has conducted a lengthy investigation of Jamaat ul-Fuqra and its front organization, the Muslims of America. Their efforts culminated earlier this year in their movie Homegrown Jihad, which included excerpts from a secret jihad video featuring Sheikh Gilani and Jamaat ul-Fuqra mujahideen training with automatic weapons and explosives.H/T vladtepesblogdotcom

Investigative report by Douglas J. Hagmann, DirectorPrivate undercover team exposes nationwide network of radical, anti-U.S. Islamic centers and supports our investigative findings…Mosques and Islamic centers in the U.S. are actively teaching jihad ideology and paramilitary training in the U.S. “I have sources – inside sources. These people at Best are armed and dangerous. They are doing paramilitary training there.”– Statement by former city council member about an Islamic Center in the city of Buffalo, NY. [Reported by Douglas J. Hagmann, director of the Northeast Intelligence Network, September, 2004]“Our initial investigation has concluded there are between 400 to 500 radical Islamic centers in the U.S. In those places, they preach an extreme version of Islam that says America and the West is the enemy. They espouse violence, hatred and the need for terrorism.” –Reported by David Gaubatz, director of counterintelligence and counterterrorism for the Society of Americans for National Existence and former senior U.S. intelligence official, June 2007

Image from covert surveillance of Islamic center in Buffalo, NY. Children playing or paramilitary exercise?28 June 2007: On 27 May 2005, the Northeast Intelligence Network published an investigative report titled Islamic Jihad Training in America? that summarized the findings of our extensive investigation and covert surveillance of mosques and Islamic centers inside the U.S. that are purportedly teaching Islamic “jihad” in the form of ideological teachings and paramilitary style training to members of such Islamic centers. The report is available by request (e-mailed in PDF format).

Target practice for terrorists.

School bus used for target practice located at Islamic “educational” camp in Hancock, NY. Harmless shooting, or something more sinister?
The primary focus of “Part I” of our investigation was the Islamic center located in the city of Buffalo, New York, a location that could be used as a template for other locations inside the U.S. The Northeast Intelligence Network first disclosed our investigative findings exclusively on The Tom Bauerle Show, featured on WBEN 930-AM in late 2004, prior to the issuance of our written report. Our findings, based on photographic documentation and information obtained through interviews, research, and other investigative methods, suggest that the ideology and practical aspects of Islamic Jihad is being taught at mosques and Islamic centers inside the United States, and those in charge of the Islamic centers are not being truthful to the public about their teachings. [Click "read more" above to continue reading].

In addition to photographic and other documentation we obtained relevant to the Buffalo, NY Islamic Center, the Northeast Intelligence Network found instances where the Imam of the Buffalo, NY Islamic center, Ibriham MEMON, appeared to propagate hatred of non-believers of Islam in a speech he gave at an Islamic conference – statements that could serve to exemplify our findings in this brief audio clip.
Unsurprisingly, our findings were challenged by not only those who operate the Islamic centers, but by a broader spectrum of people who, in spite of the evidence presented, did not – and still do not believe such activities and teachings are taking place. The recent investigative findings of Mr. Gaubatz, a former counter-intelligence official, are consistent with the reports we issued in 2004-05, and serve to reinforce our findings. Perhaps now more people will awaken to the fact that hundreds of Islamic centers in the United States have become a hot-bed of extremist activity; they promote violence, terrorism and hatred against America.Read the recently published findings of Mr. Gaubatz HERE.

ISLAMBERG, NY: Pakistani Terror Kingpin’s Disciples

13 February 2006: “We see children – small children run around over there when they should be in school. We hear bursts of gunfire all of the time, and we know that there is military like training going on there. Those people are armed and dangerous. We get nothing but menacing looks from the people who go in and out of the camp, and sometime they yell at us to mind our own business when we are just driving by. We don’t even dare to slow down when we drive by. They own this mountain and they know it, and there is nothing we can do about it but move, and we can’t even do that. Who wants to buy property next to that?”

Jamaat al Fuqra, a terrorist organization founded by Sheik Mubarek Ali Shah Gilani, the Islamic cleric Daniel Pearl was attempting to interview when he was kidnapped, and a group that has been linked to over two-dozen murders and fire-bombings inside the U.S., maintains active training compounds inside the United States. Perhaps the largest – and their operational headquarters, is situated on 70 acres nestled in a remote and heavily secluded area on the western edge of the Catskill Mountains in New York state, about 40 miles southeast of Binghamton, NY.

PAKISTANI TERROR SHEIKH ANGRY OVER INVESTIGATIVE REPORT

“A Message of concern to the American people from His Eminence Al Imam Sheikh SyeSyed Mubarik Ali Gilani”Investigative report issued by the Northeast Intelligence Network and co-authored by Internet researcher CP angers Pakastani Cleric.
“I am telling you, Osama doesn’t have many people in America,” Khawaja says. “But here (in Pakistan), he has lots and lots of followers there and followers who are, I am telling you, I am sure of one thing, Osama does not have even one of his followers as committed as Sheik Mubarak Gilani.Source: [url=http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/03/13/60II/main503644.shtml]CBS NEWS 60 Minutes II[/url] (about Sheikh Gilani, pictured below).

“Now, here comes the latest aggressor, Douglas J Hagmann. In one breath he concocts so many lies that one wonders how a person with common sense can do such a thing. His statements themselves are self-contradictory, identical to his predecessor, Yusuf Bodenski.” –Sheikh Syed Mubarik ‘Ali GilaniBREAKING – 29 March 2006: Sheikh Mubarik Ali Hasmi Shah Gilani, pictured above, issued a statement from his headquarters in Lahore, Pakistan. Gilani, the founder of the terrorist organization Jamaat ul Fuqra, has rubbed shoulders with various members of the terrorist groups Hamas and Hezbollah, their mullah backers, and even Osama bin Laden himself. He has trained fighters for the battlefields of Kashmir, Chechnya, and Bosnia. Gilani was in Pakistani custody for the abduction of US journalist Daniel Pearl, but has since been released. Official sources in Pakistan have indicated that Daniel Pearl was attempting to meet Gilani in the days before he disappeared in Karachi. Pakistani police arrested Gilani in Rawalpindi on January 30, 2002 and shifted him to Karachi for questioning. Although he denied any link to the abduction, police also detained several of his colleagues. Consequent to his arrest, he reportedly told his interrogators that he had links with the Pakistani intelligence agencies.
Now, Gilani is upset with the findings of an investigative report concerning Jamaat ul Fuqra issued by the Northeast Intelligence Network and Internet researcher “CP” as outlined in the report below.
The following is a statement just released by this Islamic “cleric:”29 March 2006: On the 12th of February, a so-called “interim investigative report” by an unknown private individual who called himself “CP” investigator and Douglas J. Hagmann , with the internet address, www.homelandsecurityus.com, was released. This highly questionable report about Muslims of the Americas (MOA), their town Islamberg, NY, the International Quranic Open University (IQOU), and the Vice Chancellor of IQOU, is a small part of a campaign of hate, fabricated falsehood, lies, and appalling propaganda aimed at bringing about a clash between Muslims and Christians the world over, and particularly in the United States (U.S.) As the Imam of the Muslims of the Americas and Vice Chancellor of IQOU, I take this opportunity to expose this recurring scheme of deception and falsehood conjured up by vested interests.
The compilers of this report, CP/Hagmann, assert the claim of the existence of an alleged “Jamaat-ul-Fuqra,” placing me as its head. For the past 25 years I, and the members of MOA, and the staff of IQOU at Islamberg, have adamantly denied knowledge of any such organization in the U.S., Pakistan, or elsewhere.
In order to uphold and sustain one lie, one has to use hundreds of arguments.In this regard I am going to prove that Douglas J. Hagman and his group are the actual perpetrators of international terrorism, and racial and religious bigotry and their ceaseless campaign of hate, is more damaging to the U.S. than any other country. The U.S. has become a pawn of hidden hands that use America’s wealth and the innocent blood of their sons and daughters to wage their wars against Muslims…..Source: http://www.iqou-moa.org/editorial/terror_roots.htm

Investigative Note: Gilani was in Pakistani custody for the abduction of US journalist Daniel Pearl, but has since been released. Official sources in Pakistan have indicated that Daniel Pearl was attempting to meet Gilani in the days before he disappeared in Karachi. Pakistani police arrested Gilani in Rawalpindi on January 30, 2002 and shifted him to Karachi for questioning. Although he denied any link to the abduction, police also detained several of his colleagues. Consequent to his arrest, he reportedly told his interrogators that he had links with the Pakistani intelligence agencies.

INVESTIGATIVE REPORT: Exposing Terrorists in our Midst (Download by right clicking on link, and choose “Save as” to your computer).

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About Me

My name is Nelson Abdullah. I am 77-years old and after 40 years of working for two major airlines, I retired 15 years ago in 2002, a few months after the 9-11 attack on America. My wife and I have been married for more than 56 years. We celebrated our Golden Anniversary in April 2010.
My wife and I are both lifelong Catholics and registered Republicans.

About this blog

Defending the Constitution.

Our country was created as a Constitutional Republic, a nation of laws, held together by the fabric of the Constitution. The Constitution limits the powers of the government while the first ten amendments, called The Bill of Rights, guarantee the rights of We The People.Defending the Republic.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.—That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,—That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.” —The Declaration of Independence—July 4th, 1776.

Bill of Rights

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense.

In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise reexamined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.